On Sept. 27, 1961, former Vice President Richard Nixon announced his candidacy for the 1962 California gubernatorial election. Eleven months earlier, while still vice president, he had narrowly lost his presidential bid to a young Massachusetts senator named John F. Kennedy.

Although the turnaround after the presidential loss was quick, Nixon started the campaign strong and polled well above incumbent Democratic Governor Pat Brown. But as the 1962 election progressed, the margin tightened and Nixon ultimately lost by 5 percentage points. His concession would be long known as “the last press conference” — it was certainly anything but that.

Flash forward 62 years, and we now find ourselves in a situation where a sitting vice president from California has lost the presidential election by a similar electoral margin to that of her predecessor. Of course, the times are quite different. For one, Vice President Kamala Harris was thrust to the top of the ticket without a primary, which seemed almost like an act of fate. Second, Nixon benefited from being part of an administration with a nearly 60% approval rating, compared with President Joe Biden’s 39%. Finally, unlike Nixon, Harris was not friends and colleagues with her presidential opponent. It is hard to imagine this scenario today, but Nixon and Kennedy had long been friends as well as U.S. House colleagues.

This brings us to today. Despite the seemingly Nixon-esque obituary being ascribed to Harris’ political career, one must ask whether this truly marks the end of her 20-year political journey. My answer is short: It doesn’t have to be. With the 2026 California gubernatorial election quickly approaching, Harris now finds herself in a position to pull off what Nixon could not. While the turnaround would be similar, Harris has the opportunity to do what she has previously failed to do: establish a political brand and agenda of her own, largely as a way to move past the Biden-era policies that contributed to her decisive loss on Nov. 5.

Now that she has led a formidable campaign, Harris need only look at her prospects and the issues that both excelled and inhibited her political rise. Many of those lessons can be found in the 2024 California ballot initiatives. Californians overwhelmingly voted in favor of Proposition 36, which increases penalties for certain theft and drug crimes. This issue is twofold: First, crime and border issues were key concerns for voters in this cycle; and second, Prop 36 specifically addresses the state’s approach to fentanyl — a drug commonly smuggled across the border and ports of entry. If Harris can move past the progressive stance she held in her 2020 campaign and embrace the tough-on-crime persona she briefly attempted to sell this year, she could gain the mandate to govern.

Taking those efforts into consideration, it is still important to acknowledge that California is a tough balancing act. Harris received 7.5 million votes in her 2016 Senate race — more than a million more votes than incumbent Gov. Gavin Newsom received in his 2022 reelection. However, she is lagging behind Biden’s 2020 numbers in the state. At this point, the question is whether Harris feels called to lead. If so, the governor’s office could serve as a fitting end to her political career — or a stepping stone to something even greater. Not only would it give Harris invaluable experience as a decisive chief executive, but it could also offer her the platform to define herself as a candidate. Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders has recently called for a realignment in the Democratic Party’s approach to middle-class and racially diverse voters. That notion alone could offer Harris an opportunity to establish herself as a thought and political leader in her own right.

Obviously, all of this is hypothetical. Harris could, of course, step away from politics entirely, spending her remaining years on book tours, serving as an adjunct professor, or even follow in the footsteps of former Democratic vice presidents and presidential hopefuls, Hubert Humphrey and Walter Mondale, and return to more junior roles in public service. She could even pursue a combination of these roles. That said, I believe the future is in her hands. While she may never hold the highest office in the land, we should not count her out. I do not think we have seen the last of Kamala Harris.

Jeter Long is a writer, politico, playwright and amateur American historian based in Washington, D.C.